The American Principles Project (APP), founded by conservative Catholic professor Robbie George, seems to have an inordinate fixation on gay people. In dealing with presidential appointments and, now, with the President's promise to end "Don't Ask, Don't Tell," Professor George's organization betrays a bigotry that is at the very least unseemly in a tenured professor.

Guess who's coming to breakfast? The breakfast in question would be the high-profile National Prayer Breakfast set for Feb. 4 at the Washington Hilton ballroom. And the guessing game concerns David Bahati, the Ugandan MP with close ties to the conservative Christian politicos who sponsor the annual breakfast -- and who have been cited as inspiration's for Bahati's notorious Anti-Homosexuality Bill, a.k.a. the "Kill the Gays Bill" because of its draconian criminal penalties on homosexual acts, including life imprisonment and the death penalty.

A Ugandan lawmaker on Friday refused to withdraw proposed legislation that would impose the death penalty for some gays and lesbians despite international condemnation and presidential opposition to a measure that could scare off foreign investors. Lawmaker David Bahati said he will not heed a call late Thursday from the government to drop the proposed bill, as he feels such a measure is necessary in the conservative East African country.

The terrorist threat posed by radicalized Muslim- Americans has been exaggerated, according to a study released Wednesday by researchers at Duke University and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. A small number of Muslim-Americans have undergone radicalization since the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on New York and Washington, the study found. It compiled a list of 139 individuals it categorized as "Muslim-American terrorism offenders" who had become radicalized in the U.S. in that time -- a rate of 17 per year.

"'Tell me what distinguishes the murderer at Fort Hood, the people we arrested in Denver and Detroit and New York, and the five people who were just picked up in Pakistan?'" Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich posed rhetorically in December on Meet the Press. "You could say, 'Well, they weren't Rotarians.' But it would be politically incorrect to describe the one common characteristic they have, which is they all belong to an irreconcilable wing of Islam which wants to destroy our civilization."...What proponents of this way of thinking fail to grasp is that Gingrich's language is disingenuous because it does not afford Muslims the same protections from linguistic malfeasance that we as self-identifying Christians afford ourselves.

Gay Ugandans likely won't face the death penalty after the president said he opposed the provision in proposed legislation, but an international gay rights group said Thursday even a watered-down bill would be repressive. President Yoweri Museveni has told colleagues he believes the bill is too harsh and has encouraged his ruling National Resistance Movement Party to overturn the death sentence provision, which would apply to sexually active gays living with HIV or in cases of same-sex rape according to a copy of the draft law.

Two weeks ago, I wrote about a draft bill in Uganda's parliament which would decree the death penalty for homosexuality under some circumstances, and would also establish prison terms for anyone who fails to report homosexuals to the authorities. Those provisions have drawn wide international criticism, even from fairly conservative Christian leaders who clearly sympathize with the aim of promoting faithful heterosexual marriage, such as Rick Warren and several signers of the recent "Manhattan Declaration." The latest development is that in mid-December, the Interreligious Council of Uganda, the country's major inter-faith body -- one which includes the Catholic Church -- came out in support of the bill. Meeting in Entebbe, the body of more than 200 religious leaders, reflecting the country's main Christian and Muslim groups, called upon the Ugandan parliament to resist foreign pressure to abandon the legislation.

After weeks of growing pressure to speak out against a draconian bill against homosexuals in Uganda that is backed by many of his Christian allies in the U.S. and the East African nation, Pastor Rick Warren on Thursday released a video and statement defending his earlier silence but also vigorously condemning the bill. Warren is a megachurch pastor in Southern California whose bestselling books and close ties to politicians and world leaders has made him the most prominent American preacher since Billy Graham. He began his video statement by explaining that the Anti-Homosexuality Bill of 2009 is "a law that I had nothing to do with, completely oppose and vigorously condemn."

Christian leaders who are themselves divided over homosexuality have joined forces to oppose a proposed Ugandan law that calls for the death penalty for some homosexual behavior. "Our Christian faith recognizes violence, harassment and unjust treatment of any human being as a betrayal of Jesus' commandment to love our neighbors as ourselves," reads the statement released Monday and signed by dozens of leaders. "As followers of the teachings of Christ, we must express profound dismay at a bill currently before the Parliament in Uganda." The bill calls for those convicted of involvement in homosexual acts to be sentenced to life in prison and those convicted of "aggravated homosexuality" to receive the death penalty.

A bill currently before the Ugandan Parliament sounds like an absurdist scenario from some liberal nightmare about a theocratic state: Under the proposed law -- which appears to have strong public support -- criminal penalties on homosexual acts in the East African nation would be made much harsher, and include the death penalty. Killing homosexuals for having sex? Just as shocking, however, are the links between the proposal and American Christians who have at times been rousing cheerleaders for Uganda's draconian statutes. A key episode in the trail of evidence was an event in March 2009 in the capital, Kampala, that drew three well-known conservative Christian activists from the United States who are prominent in the so-called ex-gay movement that seeks to "convert" homosexuals to make them straight.